Metal Finishing Tile, Production Method and Related Covering

ABSTRACT

This invention relates to a tile for covering surfaces in the form of one or more metallic plates and a substratum to be placed on the surface to be covered. At least one metal plate has folds forming male and female shaped elements to be connected with those of adjacent tiles to form a substantially continuous coverage.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention concerns a tile built applying at least onemetallic layer, in stainless steel or other metals, on a substratumlike, as example, a sound-deadening or a thermosetting plastic material;a number of such tiles may be used to cover surfaces in the buildingfiled. Characteristic of these tiles is that the tile sides are properlyshaped to join the tiles together to realise stable, plane andcontinuous coverings.

The surfaces to be covered could be horizontal, as a floor, or tilted,up to be vertical as are building facades or inner walls. Tiles formatis normally square or rectangular, even if there aren't limits to formattype provided that the sides are made to be joined together. Theinvention concerns also a corresponding method to realise such tiles andthe coverings obtained installing the tiles on suitable plane surfaces.Similar tiles are known being made by a metal plate bonded, with variousmethods, to a substratum of a non metallic material like, but not only,a plastic material. To apply such tiles multiple methods exists, but allof them are time consuming, needs skilled people, and are costly.Moreover the tiles implantation to the rough support requires costlyadhesives or similar, that frequently become a critical factor whenexposed to humidity or to wide thermal excursions.

An object of the present invention is to propose a new tile of the typeand for the applications just described, together with the method torealise it; the tile is carefully designed to make the implantationeasy, fast and cheap without using adhesives to fix it to the basement.The essential characteristics of the new tile, of his realisationmethod, and of the coverings obtained joining a number of such tiles,are defined by the enclosed claims. Further characteristics andadvantages of the solution, according to the present invention, will beapparent from the description given below of preferred embodiments,given purely as an indicative example without limitations, withreference to the enclosed figures, in which:

FIG. 1 illustrates, in a schematic way, a tile in section according tothe invention.

FIG. 2 is a plane view from the bottom of the tile of FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a section to show the details of the coupling of two tiles ofthe type represented by FIGS. 1 and 2.

FIG. 4 shows in a section details of the possible implantation of a tileto the basement and reinforced tiles having two metal layers.

FIG. 5 shows a different realization of the tile's coupling.

FIG. 6 shows the same coupling of the previous FIG. 3, modified to allowthe removal of a single tile from a complete pavement.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

With reference in particular to FIGS. 1 and 2, a tile 10 is illustrated,the tile being composed by a metallic plate 12, preferably but notexclusively, in stainless steel, and by a suitable plane substratum 14,made as example by sound-deadening or thermosetting plastic material.The metallic plate 12, that's the stamping surface or the top externalsurface of the covering realised assembling these tiles is coupled tothe substratum 14 by any suitable way, like, as example by bonding withadhesive. Moreover, when out of ordinary mechanical performances arerequired, given that a single metallic layer cannot exceed a certainthickness because of the surface's shaping process, the tile could bebuilt coupling more than one metallic plate, as example with two ofthem.

The tiles, will be installed on a base surface to be covered, normally aplane surface, horizontal in case of floors or tilted as in case ofslope coverings, up to vertical when covering facades or internal walls.

To guide and join together adjacent tiles 10, each tile shows, on oneside, or preferably on two consecutive sides, a female shaped joint; theopposite sides are properly male shaped, these elements being obtainedby the edges of the metallic plate of which the tile is composed. It isimportant to highlight that the tile joints according to the presentinvention, are made of homogeneous material, in the case metal, foldedwithout soldering or other complex workings. Moreover, as per FIGS. 1and 2, where the tile shown has one metallic plate 12, the four lateralprofiles are external to the substratum 14 and properly folded to obtainsaid male and female joints. The method to get the female profile 16, isto make a first fold 18 of the ending side of the plate versus the tileinner, and a second fold 20, in the opposite direction to obtain an open“Z”, with an externally facing seat 22 parallel to the tile side. Theglobal thickness of the “Z” fold is a bit less of the total tilethickness, to assure planarity. The seat 22 of the female 16, isdimensioned to host a free edge 24 of a contiguous tile, said edge beingpart of a male element 26 result of folding down and then externally asin 28 the metallic side of the tile to obtain a substantially “L” shapedprofile, where the free side 24 has a proper quote to perfectly fitinside the “V” seat 22.

With reference to FIG. 2, a rectangular tile 10 is illustrated, havingtwo female elements 16 on two contiguous sides, and two male elements 26on the contiguous opposite sides. To avoid metal interferences duringfolding and to well close the tiles one near to the other duringimplantation, the angles of the rough metal plate 12 are properly cut asper FIG. 2, detail 32. To be noticed that cuts at the angles, are madeto get a completely continuous and closed tile plane when installed.It's also possible to build tiles having only two joint, typically onthe longest dimension, instead of the four shown and described; this twoside insertion tile, is preferred for long and tightened tiles andresults cheaper.

Moreover the female joints 16 can be formed by single sub-elements 18′obtained with cuts 18″ perpendicular to the tile edge, and folding lines20 can be previously traced on the tile rear surface to improve thefolding precision. With reference to FIG. 3, details of a couple oftiles are shown, to highlight the joint of a male element 26′ and of afemale element 16, belonging to two adjacent tiles 10′ and 10 covering asurface 33.

When the surface 33 is horizontal, it's normally not necessary to fixthe tiles to the surface; anyhow, in case where the fixing is desired orpreferable, the female edge 34 can be foreseen few millimetres longer toaccept fixing screws, 38 on holes 36, as shown in FIG. 4. FIG. 4illustrates two tiles 10″ and 10′″, having metal plates 12″a, 12″b and12′41 a, 12′41 b respectively, the male and female profiles beingobtained by folding the metal plane of the external plates 12″a and12∝″a.

However the male and female joints can be obtained by folding the innerplates 12″b and 12′″b.

An even simpler fixing, is possible on the “L” shaped side as it happensat the ending lane of the coverings.

Due to the characteristics of the present invention, the implantation oftiles results simple, fast, and precise; the covering is aestheticallyvery clean, without visible screws with the metal tiles quitecontinuous. The metal joints, as made, allows the recovery of smallplanarity defects frequently present on the base rough surfaces, andcompensate the dimensional changes due to temperature variation. Animportant advantage of the invention is that the metal tiles areelectrically interconnected by a practically infinite number of points,this makes very simple the metal grounding of the complete covering whenrequested.

With reference to FIG. 5, a different form of the invention is shown;with reference to two tiles 40 and 40′, each having a metal plate 42 and42′, coupled with a substratum 44 and 44′, standing on a surface 45. Asper this implementation, the female joint element 46 is built foldingthe metal edge firstly down and secondly up; this realises a “V” seat48, where to insert a free folded down edge 50″ of the male element 52.Also with this implementation the joints could be two or four on thesides of each tile.

It's a general good practice, to simplify the replacement of eventuallydamaged tiles or to give access to under covering installations, tointerpose to normal tiles special easily removable “jolly” tiles withoutjoints or with joints of reduced length as shown in FIG. 6 where, asexample, the joining “Z” profile 16 h of the tile 10 h has an inner edgeshorter than the equivalent one of the tile 10 in FIG. 3.

As an alternative (not shown), the “jolly” tiles can be formed withoutjoints and maintained in position on the ground surface by means ofmagnetic attraction between permanent magnetically attracting elements,embedded in the ground surface and in the bottom surface of the tilesubstratum.

To build the tiles, according to the present invention, a metal plate isproperly cut at dimension and the plate corners are cut with a number ofadditional cuts made because beneficial to the precision of the foldingprocess; as example, the line of folding can be properly engraved toimprove precision.

The plate is then folded, in multiple steps, to get the tile metal platecomplete with its female and male side profiles. Finally the tile isassembled with an eventual second metal plate, and the substratum. Thecovering made without screws with tiles produced as per the invention,keeps the lower surface exactly as it was before. This is very desirableand allows temporary installations and tile reusability, importantcharacteristic for a number of applications, as example like the fairstands floors or the technical floors.

In conclusion the present invention realises, with limited investments,simple, flexible and cheap metal covering tiles characterised by aneasy, adhesive free installation method, and by a very clean aesthetic,without visible screw or other heterogeneous components. The peculiarityof the metal joint is beneficial to recover the small planarity defectsof the installation surface, important to compensate dimensional changesdue to the thermal excursion and allows easy electrical grounding.

1. A tile for covering surfaces like floors, facades, walls or others,composed by one or more metallic plates having the surface opposite tothe one eternally exposed, fixed to a plane substratum, placed on therough basement surface, the tile being characterized in that at least ametal plate thereof has, on at least two opposite sides, a couple offolds forming complementary male and female shaped elements forreciprocal insertion joints, standing between the external tile layerand the basement plane, each joint element being able for the insertionand the retention of a complementary profile on the adjacent tile.
 2. Atile, according to claim 1, wherein substratum for placement on therough basement surface comprises a sound-deadening material.
 3. A tile,according to claim 1, wherein substratum for placement on the basementsurface is made of plastic material, preferably a thermosetting one. 4.A tile, according to claim 1, wherein the insertion and couplingelements extend along the related tile lane, with the exception of thetile corners.
 5. A tile, according to claim 1, wherein the tile plane islimited from the metallic plate(s) on the four corners.
 6. A tile,according to claim 1, wherein the insertion and coupling elements aremade by folding the tile metal plate and are external respect to thesubstratum plate.
 7. A tile, according to claim 1, wherein it has afemale insertion and coupling element on one side only of the tile and acorresponding male insertion and coupling element on the opposite tileside.
 8. A tile, according to claim 1, wherein it has two femaleinsertion and coupling elements on two contiguous sides of the tile andtwo male insertion and coupling elements on the other contiguous sides.9. A tile, according to claim 1, wherein the female insertion andcoupling element is formed by a “Z” shaped folding of the edge of themetallic plate, said folding starting from the external surface towardthe basement surface.
 10. A tile according to claim 9, characterized inthat said “Z” shaped folding is formed by a plurality of “Z” shapedparallel parts separated by cuts perpendicular to said “Z” folding. 11.A tile, according to claim 9, wherein the arm of the “Z” 11 shapedfolding that is parallel and adjacent to the basement surface has holesfor screws or other fixing means to said basement surface.
 12. A tile,according to claim 9, wherein the male insertion and coupling element isformed by an “L” shaped folding of the edge of the metallic plate, saidfolding starting from the external surface toward the surface to becovered to create an edge, parallel to said surfaces.
 13. A tile,according to claim 12, wherein the arm of the “L” shaped folding that isparallel and adjacent to the surface to be covered, has one or moreopenings to allow the tile fixing to the surface to be covered withscrews or other elements.
 14. A tile, according to claim 13, wherein thearm of said “L” shaped folding is dimensioned to enter inside theopening of said “Z” folding, up to the contact of two adjacent tiles.15. A tile, according to claim 1, wherein the female insertion andcoupling element is obtained by a folding into an “L” shape a metallicplate edge, from the external tile plane, versus the surface to becovered, and to create a first edge portion parallel to these surfaces,and a second edge portion in continuation of the first one and formingan “U” seat open towards the tile.
 16. A tile, according to claim 15,wherein the first edge portion has one or more openings to allow thetile fixing with screws or other elements to the surface to be covered.17. A tile, according to claim 15, wherein the male insertion andcoupling element is obtained by a folding into an “L” shape of a metalplate edge, going from the external tile plane, versus the surface to becovered, and in direction of the tile body, to create a free edgebetween such surfaces.
 18. A tile, according to claim 17, wherein thefree edge is dimensioned to enter inside the “U” shaped seat of saidfemale element, up to the contact of two adjacent tiles.
 19. A tile,according to claim 1, and formed with at least two metallic overlappedplates and said plane substratum, wherein the male and female insertionand coupling elements are part of the more external metal plate.
 20. Atile, according to claim 1, and formed with at least two metallicoverlapped plates and said plane substratum wherein the male and femaleinsertion and coupling elements are part of the more internal metalplate.
 21. A covering for floors, facades or other surfaces, realizedwith a number of tiles made according to claim 1, having complementaryinsertion and coupling elements for keeping the tiles closed one to theothers.
 22. A covering according to claim 21, wherein one or more“jolly” tiles are missing of one or more insertion joints to facilitatea partial or complete removal of the installed covering.
 23. A coveringaccording to claim 21, wherein one or more “jolly” tiles have one ormore shorter insertion joints to facilitate a partial or completeremoval of the installed covering.
 24. A covering according to claim 21,wherein the one or more tiles are standing on the covered surface,without <-> being fixed or interfering with such surface.
 25. A coveringaccording to claim 21, wherein it is applied on a floating floor.
 26. Acovering according to claim 21, wherein at least one of the metallictiles is electrically grounded.
 27. A method for producing tilesaccording to claim 1, comprising the steps of: cut to measure and cutthe corners of a metallic plate to get plates ready to produce metallictiles; folding two or four sides of each tile metallic plate to form oneor two insertion and coupling female elements and one or two maleinsertion and coupling elements; add in case additional metallic plates;and add a plane substratum.
 28. A method according to claim 27, whereinthe folds of said female insertion and coupling elements are pressed toget thickness lower than the one of the tile.
 29. A method according toclaim 26, wherein performing cuts or line marking on the metal plate toimprove the precision of the subsequent folding operation.